As usual, you can expect some exquisite Korean crafts to be on show at Collect this year at Somerset House, 27 February – 1 March (with preview days). Sadly, though, as far as I can see, there won’t be the Icheon Ceramics / Han Collection collaboration that has given so much pleasure over the past few years. Here are the galleries we’ve spotted which are focused on Korean crafts:
Lloyd Choi Gallery
EAST WING, E6 | gallery page
For Collect 2026, the gallery presents a highly curated selection of contemporary Korean ceramic artists who reinterpret this enduring ceramic language beyond inherited decoration. Rooted in one of the most revered traditions in art history, the works shift attention from ornament to material presence and process.
Long associated with refinement and symmetry, the palette is reactivated through gesture and experimentation. Cobalt emerges as mark, trace and atmosphere rather than controlled embellishment. Deliberate restraint and considered space invite pause and reflection.
Artists
Boram Choi (ceramics) | Hyeyoung Kwak (ceramics) | Jungsuk Lee (ceramics)
Choi Boram (b. 1985) constructs sculptural forms from coarse clay assembled in visible patches and fired unglazed. Thousands of hand-drawn cobalt lines retain the raw trace of labour. In her Blue Jar – Undoing series, she introduces void space, allowing emptiness to shape the composition and transform blue and white into a deconstructive abstraction.
Lee Jungsuk (b. 1970) reconfigures blue and white porcelain through erosion, instability and the beauty of decay. Through deliberate abrasion and surface dissolution, fading cobalt traces evoke excavated objects, while repurposed blue label stickers subtly disrupt the illusion of antiquity and blur the boundary between contemporary object and historical relic.
Kwak Hyeyoung (b. 1982) employs the contrast of blue and white to evoke the presence of nature, particularly rain. Working with rainfall as both material and collaborator, she places cobalt-layered porcelain panels outdoors so that falling drops leave rivulets, pools, and atmospheric washes across the surface.
Siat Gallery
WEST WING, W9 | gallery page
For Collect 2026, Siat Gallery presents ‘The Time of Things’, a curated presentation of contemporary Korean craft spanning wood, metal, textile, leather, denim, and paper. The works explore how materials hold memory, and how time operates not only as a process but as an active collaborator in making.
They display traces of labour, repetition, repair, erosion, and renewal, reflecting a distinctly Korean sensibility grounded in restraint, patience, and material intelligence. Dialogues between tradition and experimentation invite viewers to consider how objects accumulate history, emotion, and meaning.
Now in its fourth participation at Collect, Siat Gallery reaffirms its commitment to sharing innovative Korean craft with a global audience.
Artists
Minyeol Cho (fibre) | Sungho Cho (metal) | Hoyeon Chung (jewellery) | Junghoo Kim (jewellery) | Junsu Kim (leather) | Minhee Kim (fibre) | Sooyeon Kim (paper) | Honggu Park (wood) | Joo Hyung Park (wood)
Collect Open – Jihyun Kim
EAST WING, E9 | exhibitor page
Jihyun Kim is a South Korean ceramic artist based in London, whose practice draws on Korean folklore, ritual, and ideas of protection and belonging. At Collect Open 2026, she will present Salty Fairy Ring, an immersive installation of slip-cast ceramic salt vessels arranged in a circular formation. Using her distinctive ‘gloop’ glaze technique, Kim creates vividly coloured, fungus-like forms that appear to defy gravity. The work weaves together Korean beliefs in salt as a protective material with European fairy-ring mythology, inviting audiences to step into an immersive environment shaped by ideas of protection, ritual, and shelter.
Korean artists in other galleries
- Joo Woo-jin (textiles) at Ruup & Form (East Wing E17)
- Lee Jaejun (ceramics) at Cavaliero Finn (West Wing W17)
- Yu Ahmi, Kim Heejoo and Shin Healim (jewellery) at Objects Beautiful (South Wing S12)
- Park Jongjin and Kim Jin-eui (ceramics) at Daguet-Bresson (South Wing S7)